Dreamwalking
by Soozie Quixotic
Summary: World-walking in her sleep lands Adriane in a very awkward situation. Zach isn't sure how to deal with this. Adriane/Zach. One-shot.


Contains: under-18 character, sex references, making out, sexual situation but no actual sex.

I really wanted to write an Adriane/Zach fic, so here it is! I had a hard time deciding whether to rate this T or M, but then I remembered that the MPAA gave _Austen Powers _a PG-13, so T it is. This takes place when Adriane is 16-ish and Zach is 18-ish, so I noted under-18 in the summary for anyone whose government has laws against viewing that, etc.

Please review!

o-o-o-o-o-o-o

She was world-walking in her sleep again.

Perched on the end of her bed in just a light t-shirt, Adriane touched the scratches on her ankle. Painless, but maybe she was just distracted by the humid broiler was supposed to be her bedroom. The tiny breeze from the window wasn't enough to save her from this sweltering summer night. That afternoon, the cottage's ancient air conditioner had died and the repairman couldn't save her until tomorrow. At least Gran was away, visiting her sister in Vermont; tough as the old woman was, Adriane would've worried about her in heat like this.

For the past week she'd dreamed of running across the Spirit Trail and the forests of Fairy Glen, waking up with mud, leaves, and scrapes adorning her body. Ever since her first dream-walk three years ago, when Ravenswood was infested with dark magic, it had become a warning signal for anything that threatened her.

Unfortunately, "anything that threatened her" wasn't limited to ferocious monsters. She would've rather fought them than the feelings that had been boiling inside her for a week, ever since her last visit to Aldenmor.

o-o-o-o-o-o-o

It had been sunset at Prince Marlin's birthday ball, held at a royal terrace on a cliff by the sea. She and Zach were playfully arguing with Lorren, something about elven swords versus goblin swords, when Kara whirled the Goblin Prince into another dance with a smile and wink at Adriane. Barbie loved matchmaking almost as much as shopping.

Alone at last, Adriane tried to look cool and casual when she asked him to walk down to the beach. Her heart beat madly as they followed the steep and winding path from the terrace, catching each other as they stumbled in those fancy shoes that they weren't used to wearing.

The setting sun painted the sea and pearly sand in fiery orange. They stood there for ages and talked about the Fairimentals' new plans for The Garden, watching the world turn to pink, deep red, and finally purple.

Adriane glanced sideways to find Zach staring at her with a faraway look that vanished as soon as their eyes met. Even in the fading light, she saw his face turn red. He liked her; she'd suspected it for a long time, but at that moment, she was absolutely sure. She had the perfect opportunity.

"Just go for it!" Kara had told her. She leaned towards him with slightly-parted lips. Like a jeeran in headlights, his eyes widened but he didn't pull away. It struck her: did he really want this, or was he just too shocked to stop her? She hesitated, so close she could feel his breath on her lips.

An explosion ripped through the air. They both whipped around, locked in fighting stances with jewels ready, to see blue and silver sparks shimmering in the sky over the terrace above.

"Fireworks," Adriane said, dazed.

She turned to Zach, who stiffly backed away and avoided her eyes.

"I'm sorry. I, I have to…," he mumbled before tearing off towards the path.

She just stood there, gaping like an idiot.

o-o-o-o-o-o-o

Adriane sighed and paced around her little bedroom.

"Why am I so stupid?" she asked a Beatles poster on the wall. "That was my one chance and I ruined it. He's avoiding me. I need to see him but that'll just drive him away again. What the hell do I _do_?"

John, Paul, George, and Ringo didn't answer.

"Well," she whispered to herself. "I'm going to do something. He's staying in The Garden to help put up a new portal system. Tomorrow, I'll go there and…I don't know. I'll figure it out."

Honestly, she thought as she settled down in bed, she didn't know if she wanted to apologize or try again—maybe both. The boy was literally raised by _wolves_; he was confident as anything struggling against monsters and mother nature, but when it came to people and relationships, he was completely out of his element.

Adriane already felt sweat under her shirt. She stripped it off and tossed it on the floor. It was just too hot to sleep in anything. If she was going to dream-walk again, then frolicking naked through the Spirit Trail and Fairy Glen would be a fun new experience. After all, no one but the Spirit Pack could see her; she couldn't imagine human nudity bothering them.

The window breeze picked up, cooling her bare skin as she drifted to sleep.

o-o-o-o-o-o-o

Like a dizzying dream, the magic glade rushed past Adriane as she plunged into the Rocking Stone, Ravenswood's gate to the spirit world. She was engulfed by dark vacuum of in-between planes for only a moment before emerging on the Spirit Trail.

Her bare feet stood on a path of mist and silver stars, which wound through the vast black space before her. She howled to the spirit pack, and was greeted by an eerie harmony of calls that shook the trail beneath her.

Ghostly wolves materialized from the mist. She ran with them.

_Hello again, wolf sister_, they said. _Where do you go?_

_Fairy Glen._ Her answer surprised herself. She hadn't thought about a destination at all, though Fairy Glen made sense; she'd gone there in all of her dream-walks before.

Ahead, a blazing light appeared on the trail and twisted open into a portal.

_This is the way_, the pack bid goodbye with a final howl. Adriane leapt into the light.

Trees and stars streaked by as Adriane touched down in Fairy Glen at night. The two moons overhead added to the distorted glow that was always cast on the spirit plane. Nights on Aldenmor were always so much brighter than ones on Earth. She kept running wildly, now ablaze with a strange longing that had sparked out of nowhere. She needed to find something here, but _what_?

The still and shining lake appeared before her, half-shrouded in mist that reached across her path. She couldn't see through, but she charged into it with blind determination.

Suddenly, there was nothing. All around her was black and empty; she tumbled through the in-between.

_Thump_. The breath was knocked out of her. Gasping, she flung open her eyes to see a sky of twin moons and twinkling stars. She lay on soft Fairy Glen grass, very much in the physical world.

A warm breeze brushed her skin as a giggle trembled through the air.

"Who's there?" Adriane whispered, sitting upright.

From the mist emerged a woman's transparent face, smiling almost mischievously.

"Ambia!" Adriane moved to bow, but the Air Fairimental just giggled again.

_What brings you to Fairy Glen seven nights in a row, Warrior?_

Adriane couldn't answer. Of course the Fairimentals would've noticed her wandering around the spirit plane of their home. It was almost embarrassing.

_World-walking in one's sleep only happens in times of great threat or anxiety. I take it the web isn't in danger?_

"Uh, n-no. It's a personal thing."

_Is the cause, perhaps, a personal thing that passed between you and a certain human, about which I overheard that certain human telling Okawa…_

Adriane felt her face flush as she was struck dumb. Now, the elemental beings that ruled an entire world knew all about her romantic screw-up. She could only think of a sarcastic comeback, her greatest defense, but she couldn't say _that_to a Fairimental.

_Warrior, I believe that your magic is trying to tell you something by leading you here. You greatly need to see a certain person._

"No, that doesn't make sense." Adriane frowned. "He's in The Garden, setting up the new portal system. Why would I look for him here?"

_Magic follows magic, not conscious knowledge. Besides, where does a person go when he is upset but the place that he finds most comforting?_

"Adriane? Is that you?" a voice called from the lake. Speak of the devil; she'd know that voice anywhere.

"Zach?" she whispered. "Zach!"

She stood and ran to the water's edge, barely glancing back to find that Ambia had vanished. From the mist came splashing and a shadow of Zach swimming towards her. The figure grew sharper and clearer until Zach appeared, up to his shoulders in water.

"Hey Adriane, what are y—" He froze in place with his mouth gaping in mid-word, shocked face lit up by the moons reflected on the water.

She'd been waiting for this moment for days, but now she couldn't look him in the eyes. As her gaze drifted down, she found that she was completely naked except for a pair of black panties.

Naked.

Naked in front of the guy that she'd liked for years. The guy who, swimming alone in the middle of the night, was probably naked too. On an Aldenmor night like this, he could see _everything_.

She crossed her arms over her chest at the speed of light.

Mortifying. Every nightmare of being naked at the ridiculously wrong time and place just came true. This was either the perfect opportunity or the perfect potential for disaster. Either way, she was terrified.

Look casual, she told herself. She was the warrior; being calm under pressure was as easy as breathing. Zach was raised by wolves and elves; _naked_ didn't mean the same thing to him as it did to American humans like her, right? It was probably normal on hot summer nights. Besides, her freaking out would only freak him out more.

She finally looked up. He definitely wasn't staring at her face. That was no surprise, but what truly shocked her was that under the piercing awkwardness, it was kind of…hot. She pressed her thighs together, as if to smother the feeling.

"What?" she said defensively. "What's so fascinating?" It was the only thing she could think to say.

"Huh?" He shook himself as if trying to wake up.

"Haven't you ever seen a naked girl before?"

"No."

That shut her up for a second. Sure, he hadn't met another human until three years ago, but he'd visited Earth dozens of times since then. Stonehill was hardly a nudist colony, but had he really never seen _anything_?

"Not even in pictures or movies?"

"No."

"Hey—what about elves? They're naked sometimes, right?"

"Yeah, sometimes, but never women around men, or men around women. Don't humans have rules like that too?" Probably realizing, at last, that he was breaking the staring-is-rude rule, Zach cleared his throat and pretended to study the fascinating rock formation to his left.

"Yeah, where I come from on Earth, you can really only be naked when you're alone, in the shower, or…" _having sex_, but she couldn't scare him away again.

So hers were the first boobs he'd ever seen in his life. On one hand, that was pretty depressing, but on the other hand, he didn't have a basis for comparison. Either way, embarrassment was burning her face away.

"Then why are you naked? You're not alone or showering." His sideways glance was so serious and accusing, Adriane almost laughed.

"I _was_ alone! It was too hot to sleep with clothes on, and then I world-walked here in my sleep, so—"

"What?" Suddenly concerned, he waded towards her. "That's not normal. Are you okay?"

The shallows revealed his chest and arms, shining wet in the moonlight. Now she couldn't blame him for staring at her; she was doing the same to him.

Not only was he gorgeous, but he didn't seem angry for what she'd tried a week ago. If he still cared about her, then maybe she still had a chance—and he was still her friend.

"Y-yeah, I'm fine. Just stress. Magic does weird stuff with emotions," she said.

He stopped with the water at his waist.

Rustling leaves in the nearby forest filled the awkward silence.

"S-so that's why I'm here, but why are you?" She desperately changed the subject. "Aren't you supposed to be in The Garden?"

"I come home at night. It's easier to sleep here, but I have…what's the human word? Inertia?"

"Insomnia." Despite everything, Adriane laughed nervously. She barely managed to stop, suddenly overcome by the utter absurdity of two teenagers making small talk while alone and naked in the middle of the night.

"That. Whenever I try to sleep, I…Your leg—it's bleeding."

"Huh?" Adriane looked down at herself. Sure enough, some branch had given her shin a nasty scratch. She was covered in not only sweat, but dirt and grass stains, probably from falling into the physical world. So much for naked in the moonlight being sexy; now she just felt gross.

"Uh, I'll wash off in here then." She didn't bother to test the water, but it proved refreshingly cool as she quickly waded in until all of her was covered. Her long black hair fanned out around her. Unexposed, she felt lighter and the raging blush all over her body finally faded.

Zach turned away from her and she thought she heard him take a deep and shaking breath.

So now they were skinny-dipping together. What did that mean to someone from Aldenmor? She didn't think it was possible, but her heart hammered even faster than before. Fleetingly, she wondered if tonight, she could get more than just a cute kiss—no, no way. Things couldn't happen that fast, and she wasn't prepared for that, was she? Either way, he definitely wasn't.

The lake was so still that she barely felt waves ripple along her skin. Everything was still: the breeze settled, the forest silent, and no other living souls in sight. She didn't even sense the Fairimentals; they must have kindly given her and Zach some privacy. It was a world of difference from the party last week.

"Hey Zach, why are you swimming out here in the middle of the night?" she asked.

"I can't sleep. This helps me calm down." He brushed wet sandy brown hair away from his eyes as he slowly waded towards her, but stopped with about a yard between them.

She saw that he held himself back, not angry, but afraid. He was rubbing his fingers together in that nervous way of his. They were just nervous, both of them. They would never move beyond this if someone didn't take the first step, and Adriane had already decided that that someone would be her.

She drifted in his direction. "And you can't sleep because you keep thinking about when I tried to kiss you." She didn't mean it that bluntly, but Adriane Charday was nothing if not blunt. "That's why I world-walked here. I need to see you, to say sorry and—"

Zach grasped her wrist. "Sorry? You didn't do anything wrong—I did! I'm sorry for running, it's just that," He laughed bitterly. "I don't know how to be human."

"What are you talking about?" Adriane's hand covered his and she drew closer before she realized what she was doing. "You're a great human! Better than most humans I know."

This close, she thought she saw his face redden.

"You know what I mean! I…I don't know what I'm supposed to do. I panic. I want to, but I don't know how. You have no idea how many times I was going to kiss you or tell you something, but I stopped because I didn't know if it was the right time or place or whatever. I'd go to a beach party naked if you didn't just tell me that it wasn't okay."

"Zach…"

Before Zach could catch his breath, she closed the distance and wrapped her arms around him in a tight hug. Adriane felt him gasp as the water splashed around them. She had hugged him hundreds of times before, but the sensation of her bare chest pressed to his was more jarring than she would've imagined; before this moment, she realized, her breasts had never touched the skin of another person. In the silent seconds when she remembered what she was saying, Zach hugged her back, light and unsure.

"I'm not good with people either," she whispered. "I didn't try anything until last week because I couldn't even tell if you wanted me."

"See? I can't even get _that_ across! I can't do this. I spent almost all my life as the only one of my kind here; that's fate saying that I'm not supposed to be with other humans."

"That's the stupidest thing you've ever said! If you weren't supposed to be with other humans, you would've never met me, Emily, Kara, or anyone. I wouldn't be here right now—come on, Zach, I unconsciously dream-walked to you _naked_. That's fate proving you wrong!"

Suddenly, he grasped her so tightly that she could barely breathe. She couldn't see his face and they weren't touching below the waist, but she got the idea.

"Then teach me."

"Teach you what?" she whispered in his ear, out of reduced lung capacity rather than sexiness.

He pulled away just enough that they could face each other. His green eyes were wide and his face flushed, with pieces of wet hair flung wildly in every direction.

"Start where you left off." Giving her no chance to respond, he buried his fingers in her hair and pressed his lips to hers, harder than she'd expected.

She caught him even more off-guard, wrapping her legs loosely around his waist as she opened her mouth and slipped her tongue between his parted lips. He hesitated for only a second before he got the idea and cautiously slid his tongue against hers. They moved against each other with the off-kilter rhythm of beginners at anything.

Adriane finally felt her lungs burn for air. She broke away just enough for a few gasping breaths and murmured "Yeah, breathing. That's important."

Zach grinned "I can hold my breath longer than you," but couldn't disguise that he was panting too.

"I take that as a challenge."

She brought their mouths together again and he sunk them both underwater until, she imagined, they left no trace but bubbles and her black hair swirling on the surface.

o-o-o-o-o-o-o

The end. So this was a twist on those terrifying dreams about being naked in inappropriate situations-only it's _real_! P.S. I love reviews.


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